| Tract Live A rt |
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| Site specific live art and performance in and around Penzance, Cornwall, over three weekends. Summer 2006 | ||||||||||
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| Information on this site will be updated as part of the Tract Live Art Programme | ||||||||||
A select audience were ushered into the claustrophobic atmosphere of one of the grand Victorian council rooms in St Johns to be met by Roddy Hunter, a display cabinet, a chair leaning against the wall and some video equipment.
Roddy, dressed in black, started by circling the audience, staring at them intently and creating a hushed sense of anticipation. He then started reading from a script, all the time pacing restlessly. With his Scottish accent, he had the demeanor of a slightly crazed Presbyterian minister: an appearance also in-keeping with the content of his performance, which poetically mixed political, local and biblical references with a meditation on place, and the distinction that is made between East and West. Roddy remarked on the obelisk that is to be seen on the seafront in Penzance, and on the place name ‘Market Jew Street’. He alluded to Salome and the beheading of John the Baptist: after whom the building is named. He did so whilst bracketing the performance with the mantras ‘I am West facing West, I am West facing East’ and ‘where is the furthest point from which to begin a journey?’
Written in a style not unlike Ezra Pound, the references in the script around which the performance hinged were many and the layers thick. This complexity was deliberately compounded by the use of esoteric visual symbolism: tape-measures laid on the floor, bars of silver, and by the troubled way Roddy used red ink to inscribe letters onto his torso.
There was nothing nostalgic or sentimental about Roddys performance. In untangling this complex web of associations, he required of his audience concentration and intelligence, patience and thought. The seriousness of Roddys intentions was apparent from the outset and sustained attention on the part of the viewer brought its own rewards.
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